No, it was no more help to her than the dreadful paint with which she plastered her haggard features.
It was not the least use to her....
Her death is the best thing that could have happened, for her own sake and for those belonging to her. But I cannot take my thoughts off the hours which preceded her end; the time that passed between the moment when she decided to commit suicide until she actually carried out her resolve.
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"If men suspected ..."
It may safely be said that on the whole surface of the globe not one man exists who really knows a woman.
They know us in the same way as the bees know the flowers; by the various perfumes they impart to the honey. No more.
How could it be otherwise? If a woman took infinite pains to reveal herself to a husband or a lover just as she really is, he would think she was suffering from some incurable mental disease.
A few of us indicate our true natures in hysterical outbreaks, fits of bitterness and suspicion; but this involuntary frankness is generally discounted by some subtle deceit.
Do men and women ever tell each other the truth? How often does that happen? More often than not, I think, they deal in half-lies, hiding this, embroidering that, fact.